Russian President Vladimir Putin granted US whistleblower Edward Snowden Russian citizenship on Monday. Since 2013, Snowden has been living in Russia to escape prosecution in the US after leaking secret files related to the US National Security Agency (NSA) and the CIA.
Snowden was working as a contractor with the NSA when he leaked the files. His wife, Linsay Mills, will also reportedly apply for Russian citizenship.
Edward Snowden was born in 1983 in North Carolina, US. He attended the school till the tenth grade and dropped out after falling ill.
He, however, did not return to school to finish his studies. He grew more attracted to computers, technology, and Japanese anime.
In 2004, Snowden joined the US Army Reserve but was later discharged after breaking both of his legs during a training session.
In 2006, he was hired by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) as a private contractor. He worked in Geneva, Tokyo, Maryland, and finally, Hawaii. In Hawaii, he decided to leak the crucial information because he could not "in good conscience allow the US government to destroy privacy, internet freedom and basic liberties for people around the world with this massive surveillance machine."
Snowden told The Guardian that he had started to get disillusioned with the US government's policies while he was in Geneva in 2009. However, he waited, hoping that Barack Obama would change the system.
"[Mr Obama] continued with the policies of his predecessor," he said.
In 2009, he gave...
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